Lafayette Times

#5 Purdue Holds off Illinois 76-71

[5] Purdue 76, Illinois 71 (Postgame Notes)

Purdue wrapped up the regular season with a 76-71 victory over Illinois in front of the 57th straight sellout at Mackey Arena.

The win improved Purdue to 26-5 overall while finishing 15-5 in the Big Ten Conference. The Boilermakers are guaranteed to win the Big Ten Conference regular-season race by three games, the first time since 2014 (Michigan) that a team has won the league title by at least three games.

Purdue has finished in the top three of the Big Ten standings in seven of the last nine seasons.

Purdue's 26 regular-season wins are the second most in a regular-season in school history, behind just the 27 wins during the 1987-88 season (27-3 record).

Purdue's 51 regular-season wins over the last two seasons are tied for the most in a two-year stretch in school history, set three previous times. Overall, Purdue is 55-13 since the start of last season, tied for the fourth-most wins in a two-year span in school history.

Purdue improved to 14-1 under Matt Painter against Illinois when scoring at least 70 points.

Purdue is now 18-5 against KenPom Top 100 opponents this season, the second-most wins nationally (Kansas – 20).

Fletcher Loyer and Braden Smith combined for 19 points, giving the duo 669 points this season, the third-most points for a freshman duo in school history. The pair is just the fourth set of freshman teammates to score at least 300 points in a season (2013 – A.J. Hammons, Ronnie Johnson; 2008 – E'Twaun Moore, Robbie Hummel; 1997 – Brian Cardinal, Jaraan Cornell).

Brandon Newman scored a season-high 19 points with six rebounds, a career-high five assists and three steals.

Zach Edey scored 17 points with six rebounds, two assists and a blocked shot. He finished the Big Ten Conference season as the league leader in scoring (21.9 PPG), rebounding (13.1) and field goal percentage (.591) in league games only.

Edey joins Ohio State's Gary Bradds (1963-64) as the only players to lead the Big Ten in scoring, rebounding and field goal percentage in the same season.

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. -- Brandon Newman scored a season-high 19 points, Zach Edey added 17, and No. 5 Purdue held on to beat Illinois 76-71 on Sunday to become the first Big Ten team since 2014 to win the league title by three or more games.

The Boilermakers (26-5, 15-5) led by 24 early in the second half before the Illini rallied and eventually tied the game at 67 on a free throw by Matthew Mayer with 1:17 to go. Edey's layup gave Purdue a 69-67 edge with 56 seconds left, and Illinois turned over the ball with 31 seconds left.

Purdue's Fletcher Loyer sank two free throws to push the lead to 71-67 after an immediate foul. Mayer missed a 3-point shot and Newman made two free throws to push the lead to 73-67. Luke Goode hit a 3-pointer to close the gap to 74-71 with 7 seconds left, but Newman hit two free throws to seal it.

"For myself, it's been challenging, there's been a lot of ups and downs," said Newman, who averaged 5.6 points entering the game and had 15 points in the first half. "I just want to help my teammates win games. I was able to get some open looks from feeding into the post."

Painter said Newman has earned more minutes lately with his defensive play.

"If he plays with that kind of effort and energy on the defensive end, you are going to stay in the game," Painter said. "When you stay in the game, he's a good enough offensive player he's going to make shots. He took what the defense gave him."

Braden Smith added 15 points for the Boilermakers. Edey, who entered the game with 23 double-doubles, finished with six rebounds and was played just 8 minutes in the first half after picking up two fouls.

"It was huge because we built the lead with Zach not being in there," Purdue coach Matt Painter said.

The Boilermakers led 47-26 at half behind 62% shooting, but dropped to just 29% in the second half.

"It's kind of been our story," Illinois coach Brad Underwood said. "It's a challenging first half. We gave them live ball turnovers, we didn't execute. It's been our inability to execute on the offensive side early has been has been real problematic."

Mayer led the Illini (20-11, 11-9) with 16 points, followed by Terrence Shannon Jr. with 13, Sencire Harris with 11 and Goode's 10 points. Underwood said the team missed freshman guard Jayden Epps, who was sidelined with a concussion.

Underwood said of the second half that his team "settled in and look like a really good basketball team and made them guard us."

Original source can be found here.